Walking around the city, visiting the Victoria & Albert museum, a few journeys on the tube, a couple of dinners and a Warner Bros. Harry Potter studio tour - those things pretty much sum up my 36 hours in London. It wasn't until on the train back home that I realised that I hadn't even been shopping anything! I was maybe a bit disappointed with myself right there and then, but at least my bank account is grateful :D

I spent most of the Saturday just walking around on my own, trying to find my way from one place to another with the help of Google Maps. After a few unnecessary detours I eventually got to the Victoria & Albert museum, where I spent a good few hours. Seeing absolutely everything simply isn't possible as there's so much to see and explore in the museum, but I picked the things I was most interested in and went to see those. I chose the V&A as my destination not only because of its convenient location considering our hotel, but also because of its design exhibitions. Right now they have for example an exhibition called Undressed that is all about underwear and its history.

Most of the Sunday was spent at the Warner Bros. Harry Potter studios with my mum, sister and younger little brother, and I don't even know who was the most excited to be there. I have to be honest and say that I did get a bit sentimental at times when seeing all those places that were so important to me as a child right there under my own eyes. And if they happened to play a suitable song from the movies in the background then it didn't take long at all until I started to get sentimental and nostalgic. I think it was only now that I realised how big and important thing the whole series with its books and movies was for me when I was little. We spent many afternoons and evenings immersing ourselves into the magic world with my best friends, and within our classmates we were often called 'the Harry Potter nerds'. And now it's quite fun to see my ten-year younger sister getting just as excited about Harry Potter as I did ten years ago.

We stayed at the Lexham Gardens hotel, located in Kensington, and I can definitely recommend that one! Beautiful and quiet area, good underground connections, nice rooms and friendly staff, and the price is very reasonable too. My mum is an experienced London traveller and she said that this was definitely the best hotel she's stayed at in London.

36 hours in London passed by super quickly and I didn't take as many pictures as I had originally thought and wanted to after all. But despite the short and quickly passing time, London was such as amazing yet again. You just can't get tired of this city!

Back home from London now and I was faced with quite a busy schedule first thing on a Monday morning, which has of course led to silence here on the blog. We're approximately midway through the trimester now, which means that first presentations are approaching and as these couple of weekends are spent with loved ones I'm trying to get as much done as possible during the weekdays. But seeing my friends and family is definitely worth it all!

I decided to start sharing London pictures with with this outfit from our dinner on Saturday, purely because these are probably my favourite outfit pictures like.. ever! I do like the outfit of course, but I guess the main reason is that gorgeous background after all. London is just so beautiful and full of picturesque streets, I wish I had the chance to shoot all of my outfits in London! Maybe someday ;)

So, this was the outfit I wore to dinner on Saturday, before which I wondered around Dover Street Market for a little while and I think I might have fallen in love. If you're in London then do visit, the shop itself is already worth seeing! I had only a few pieces of clothing to carry me through the whole weekend, and black jeans combined with a lace bralette and a white v-neck t-shirt was the base for my outfit both on Saturday and Sunday. I elevated the basic combination a little bit with a white blazer and a beautiful dainty necklace, and a camel coat just works with everything and anything. Knowing my family, our dinner wasn't going to take place in any fine dining -restaurant and therefore I dared to take only white sneakers as my shoes for the weekend, and I think they add a nice casual and sporty vibe to the look. For example with ankle booties, the whole outfit would've looked different and maybe could've passed as something to wear to that fine dining restaurant as well. What do you think?

Last week ended with anything but good news. Therefore I decided that this week I would pay close attention to all the positive things, even the smallest and simplest ones if they just cheered me up and brought even a small smile to my lips. And it's actually amazing how much the tiniest of things can also better your mood, if you just consciously concentrate on them and appreciate them!

And last but not least the trip to London this weekend! In a true adventure spirit I'm hopping on a night bus tonight and I'll arrive to London tomorrow morning. I have a few hours to spend just by myself before my family arrives and the rest of the day will be spent catching up with them. On Sunday we're off to visit the Harry Potter studios and in the evening I'm already catching a train to head back. So prepare for some London posts in the near future :) Wishing you all a wonderful weekend, and please do share some of the things that've cheered you up this week!

I love the put together -feeling that having painted nails brings, but I'm also super lazy to actually paint my nails. Besides, I usually manage to somehow mess them up even when I'm trying to be very careful and give them all the time in the world to dry, which definitely isn't helping me to become more active nail painter. But now I've decided to try again, as it's precisely tiny little things like this that make the everyday life feel so much better. When the temperatures are getting lower and the nights are getting darker also my nail polish choices tend to lean towards more autumnal shades, and it's these three shades I gravitate towards during the last few months of the year.

Let's start with what is probably the most popular autumn nail shade, that being dark red / wine red / burgundy / oxblood. I seriously can't keep up with what you're supposed to call this particular shade of red, but I do know that this is a definite favourite autumn shade year after year. Of course the traditional red always looks good, but come Autumn it's nice to deepen the shade towards a bit darker one again.

Nude nails aren't particularly an autumn-only thing, but after the bright shades of Spring and Summer I often notice myself gravitating towards something more neutral to have on my nails. There's still so many options to choose from inside the nude shade family, whether you want a more brown / beige tone or one from the more pink end of the spectrum. Nevertheless, all the nude shades always look clean and put together, maybe partly because of the fact that a nude shade isn't that easy to spot if you happen to get it onto your fingertips along with the nails ;)

My last favourite Autumn shade also falls into the neutral category, and that is different tones of grey. The grayness of outdoors might of course have something to do with it, but the further into Autumn we go the more the different grey tones start to attract me. Grey also often looks very stylish and elegant on the nails, and it's usually quite a different and maybe even a surprising choice of shade.

After a little while here we go with phone snaps again, as I've been capturing moments through the lens of my phone a bit more actively recently. So here's what I've been up to during the last few weeks, some of these have already appeared on my Instagram (@pinnchie) and some have been sitting unpublished in my camera roll until today.

University of Glasgow or Hogwarts? // The floor was so beautiful I couldn't resist - #igotthisthingwithfloors // I constantly come across cute cafes and restaurants and one worth visiting is Singl-end! // Clear sky and a sunset ♥︎

Is there anything better than a proper veggie burger after a long day of walking around?! // I finally found some of that famous Glasgow street art, the paintings on the walls are amazing in here // Everyday is a leg day at the university, there's stairs everywhere // I still spotted some new blooming roses on our yard this week!

The first chai lattes of the season in Café Nero, definitely not the last ones though // Back to reality: instant coffee to go and off to class // I've always considered myself more of an independent learner, but have to say that group works also have their perks // Suede x cashmere x leather

My new favourite soup: Oh She Glows Glowing Spiced Lentil Soup ♥︎ // Waiting for the day I actually dare to buy some flowers to refresh my room // Can I just basically have everything? // Nude on my nails and nude on my lips: Essie's Lady Like and NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in the shade 'Stockholm'

I update my Instagram (@pinnchie) on a more regular basis than the blog, so make sure to click that follow button on there as well. Lately I've also been more into Insta Stories, so there's even more real time material on that side :) Besides Instagram you'll also find me on Bloglovin, Pinterest as well as Twitter. Which social media channel you prefer following?

As I've already mentioned, this Autumn I've taken up my old dancing hobby again. We even have our first performance coming up at the end of this month, and every Tuesday night is spent rehearsing for that. I haven't gotten into all that 'exercising makes you forget all the stress' -mentality ever before, but now already after a few weeks I finally understand what that phrase means at its best. On Tuesday nights my mind and concentration is only on the music and the choreography, so there's no space to think about readings, presentations, lectures and to do -lists.

Tuesday is also definitely the longest day at uni for me, as depending on the week my last tutorial will finish around 5pm. And as dance rehearsals start at 6, there isn't too much of time to waste between. Therefore clothes that I feel comfortable wearing among other fashion students but which can also be used for training have become handy. Luckily I found pieces suitable for both situations from DefShop's selection, and I think that the jacket is probably the item that makes the outfit work not only in the dancehall but in class as well. Stylishly from class to dance I'd say ;)

I also have to admit that the leggings and the college have been very frequently used around home as well. In the previous outfit post I wrote about my power dressing outfit, and this is kind of like the at home version of that. Comfortable to wear but looks really nice! So besides that tutorial at uni and dance rehearsals this outfit also works at home. What do you think?

Pictures from Edinburgh have been waiting on the memory card and hard drive already since the early September, but better late than never! I really liked Edinburgh a lot, and although we managed to see quite a good amount of the city in a few hours, there's still so much more exploring to do the next time I'm in the city ;)

So we spent one sunny early Autumn Sunday wandering around the Scottish capital that's approximately 1,5-hour bus drive away. The architecture in Edinburgh is just amazing, there's beautiful old buildings, churches and monuments everywhere, and the little alleys between the buildings are probably among the cutest ones I've ever seen. It's easy to just walk from one place to another, but we also hopped onto a sightseeing bus and therefore we saw even more of the city that would've been possible just by foot. The sightseeing tours are also great way to hear a bit more about the city's history and you get a better perception of the place.

Our original plan was to visit Edinburgh Castle the first thing after arriving, but that didn't quite go as we had planned... We had been queuing for the tickets for quite some time already when suddenly they closed the tills and we were told that because of a power cut they have stopped selling tickets and no one could tell when it was to start again. So we decided to skip the castle this time and go back to the city, which turned out to be a good decision as the power cut lasted for a good couple of hours and about half of the city was affected by it. So many cafes, restaurants and shops were also closed until the power cut was over, and apparently even Starbucks wasn't safe from its effects.

We we're a bit worried about what the electricity situation in our lunch place of choice would be, but come lunch time it seemed that the power was back on in pretty much the whole city. The Elephant House is a must visit in Edinburgh for a Harry Potter fan like me, as this is exactly the cafe where J.K. Rowling used to write. It was nice to see that the place was still in its authentic state (and no wifi! 'pretend it's 1995') and not turned into a Harry Potter temple of any kind, and I think most of the customers were actually just local Sunday lunchers and not Harry Potter tourists like us. Although the toilet was definitely been attacked by Harry Potter fans as the walls, mirrors, doors and every possible surface on expose really is covered in Harry Potter quotes, memories and greetings written by readers.

A few hours in Edinburgh were enough for us this time and after doing a little shopping at H&M Home we headed back to Glasgow. But as already said, there's still a lot more to see and this time we just got a good general image of the city. For example that castle and some museums have to be visited the next time, and fortunately short day trips like this are easy to make! Nevertheless, for my next trip I'm heading to a more southern area as in a couple of weeks time I'm traveling down to London for a super quick one night stay to see my family. I'm already so excited for the mini trip, and can't wait to visit my favourite city that always leaves me feeling inspired! And okay, it is actually quite nice to see my family in person too.